Is Washington’s good government a burden?

I moved to Washington state in the summer of 1999. My first impressions of the state were largely positive. I liked almost everything about the area—except the traffic and transportation infrastructure. That fall, as I followed the debate over Initiative 695, my reaction was one of astonishment. “Why, the hell, would anyone want to gut funding for the state’s one serious weakness?”

But I-695 wasn’t about making the state a better place in any real sense. It was an appeal to individual greed and selfishness—a “free ice cream cones for everyone!” gimmick— that didn’t fully disclose the consequences for local government services, the ferry system, and other transportation infrastructure. My conclusion that autumn was that Washingtonians had no freaking idea how good they really have it. Subsequent observations have largely confirmed this.

In February, 2005 we learned just how good we have it government-wise. The Pew-sponsored Government Performance Project (GPP) graded Washington state a B+. From the individual scores, Washington ranked as the third best state government, with only Utah and Virginia doing better. When the report came out, we were in the midst of a contested gubernatorial election. The report seemed largely overlooked.

Last year we learned just how good we have it business-wise, when Forbes’ annual survey ranked Washington state number five in the nation for business climate. And Fortune magazine rated Washington the fourth best state in which to start a business—specifically citing our “low taxes”.

And earlier this week we learned how consistently good we have it government-wise when the 2008 GPP report was released. The 2005 results were not a fluke. Once again, Washington state ranks third behind Utah and Virginia. Our grade improved slightly to an A- overall. Individual grades were A- for money, A- for people, B+ for infrastructure, and A for information (see the full report for what these categories mean and how the grading was done).

Together these four reports strongly suggest that Washington’s government and business climate are near the top in the nation. The idea contradicts two of the three major right-wing talking points. Here’s the list:

The Washington state government performs poorly

The state government hurts the business climate

We are overtaxed for what we get out of our government

The third talking point can be decomposed into two parts. First, are Washingtonians overtaxed? And second, are tax revenues efficiently utilized by the state? The first part can be evaluated objectively by looking at the per capita tax burden for state and local taxes. Information for 2005 tax revenue (the most recent available) and state population sizes can be found at the U.S. Census Bureau. (The per capita tax burdens for all states can also be found at the Washington state Department of Revenue–either source yields the same results.)

In 2005, Washington’s state and local tax “burden” ranked at number 21, or about $3,651/person. The U.S. average was $3,447. In other words, we fell slightly on high side of average, but some $2000 below first ranked New York’s cost of $5,752/person and about $1,000 above last ranked Alabama at $2,569 per person. These figures make it difficult to argue that Washingtonians are taxed outrageously. (As a percentage income—the figure most widely cited in state by state comparisons—Washington ranks 37th, well below the national average.)

What about value? Do Washingtonians get good value for their tax dollar? Consider two hypotheses. (A) Conceivably, we could all be paying a huge premium for our state government’s third-best performance. (Sort of like the lousy fuel efficiency that high-performance cars get.) (B) Alternatively, perhaps great performing governments are also highly efficient governments.

If hypothesis (A) is correct, we might use the information to find a parsimonious set of trade-offs between government performance and per capita cost. If hypothesis (B) turns out to be correct, we can rejoice in our double dose of success—a high-performance and efficient government. And then we can strike out that third right-wing talking point.

A natural way to test between these two hypotheses is by looking at the per capita costs to achieve the grade in the GPP. Since the GPP grade is a proxy for performance, we can use state tax rates to estimate the per capita cost of that performance. Here is how I’ve done this.

For all 50 states, I took the letter grades for all four categories (one each for money, people, infrastructure, and information) and converted them into numerical scores from A = 4, A- = 3.67, B+ = 3.33, …, F = 0. I then averaged the grades to get a number between 0 and 4. This gives Washington state a grade of 3.67, which is the third best score among all states.

Next, I divided the per capita tax by the numerical grade for an estimate of the efficiency—that is, we compute the cost for each unit of grade. The resulting price per grade point is akin to the price per pound when comparison shopping among, say, different brands of apples. We can directly use the numbers to find the best value around in state government.

The results are summarized in this table:

State

2005 per capita tax

Tax rank

Grade

Efficiency ($/grade)

Efficiency rank

Alabama

$2,569

50

2.17

1185

17

Alaska

$4,443

6

1.92

2314

46

Arizona

$3,079

34

2.59

1191

19

Arkansas

$2,902

44

2.09

1392

31

California

$4,055

12

2.00

2028

42

Colorado

$3,363

27

2.17

1553

36

Connecticut

$5,398

2

2.59

2088

43

Delaware

$3,894

14

3.17

1229

22

Florida

$3,369

26

2.67

1262

24

Georgia

$3,010

38

3.33

903

3

Hawaii

$4,338

7

2.17

2001

40

Idaho

$2,926

42

2.92

1004

7

Illinois

$3,849

16

1.92

2007

41

Indiana

$3,405

25

3.08

1105

14

Iowa

$3,273

30

2.83

1157

16

Kansas

$3,415

24

2.58

1322

27

Kentucky

$2,939

40

2.83

1038

9

Louisiana

$3,173

31

2.92

1089

13

Maine

$3,960

13

2.00

1980

39

Maryland

$4,276

8

2.92

1467

34

Massachusetts

$4,470

5

1.92

2334

47

Michigan

$3,494

23

3.33

1048

11

Minnesota

$4,088

11

2.83

1443

33

Mississippi

$2,575

49

2.17

1189

18

Missouri

$2,997

39

3.33

899

2

Montana

$2,913

43

2.42

1206

20

Nebraska

$3,746

18

3.09

1214

21

Nevada

$3,749

17

2.34

1606

37

New Hampshire

$3,306

29

1.33

2481

49

New Jersey

$4,890

4

2.09

2345

48

New Mexico

$3,151

32

2.50

1260

23

New York

$5,752

1

2.50

2301

45

North Carolina

$3,149

33

2.75

1144

15

North Dakota

$3,343

28

2.50

1337

28

Ohio

$3,637

22

2.67

1363

30

Oklahoma

$2,843

45

2.17

1312

26

Oregon

$3,052

36

2.42

1264

25

Pennsylvania

$3,710

19

2.75

1349

29

Rhode Island

$4,191

9

1.67

2517

50

South Carolina

$2,779

46

2.67

1041

10

South Dakota

$2,715

47

2.50

1087

12

Tennessee

$2,685

48

2.67

1007

8

Texas

$3,015

37

3.17

952

4

Utah

$2,933

41

3.83

765

1

Vermont

$4,137

10

2.50

1655

38

Virginia

$3,657

20

3.75

975

5

Washington

$3,651

21

3.67

996

6

West Virginia

$3,060

35

2.17

1412

32

Wisconsin

$3,872

15

2.50

1549

35

Wyoming

$5,251

3

2.50

2100

44

U.S.

$3,447

—

2.59

1333

—

The “efficiency” column shows how many dollars per grade point taxpayers pay in each state. The “Efficiency rank” goes from most efficient to least efficient. The best value in state government is found in Utah, where taxpayers paid $765 per grade point.

Washington state is the 6th best value (i.e. sixth most efficient government) by this measure. It cost taxpayers just under $1,000 per grade point, compared to a national average of $1,333.

The worst? Rhode Island, where taxpayers spent $4,191 for each grade point in their score.

In the individual sub-categories, Washington state does well (results not shown in the table). We are ranked 7th most efficient for money, 7th most efficient for people, 12th most efficient for infrastructure, and 7th most efficient for information. Not too shabby!

The analysis rejects hypothesis (A) in favor of hypothesis (B). We really can rejoice in our government that is both high-performance and efficient. Right-wing talking point number three would seem to be well off the mark.

One potential criticism of this analysis is that the GPP might be strongly related to efficiency—that is, higher state scores may already reflect lower per capita taxes. If so, we should see a high correlation between per capita tax and the GPP score. We don’t. The squared correlation between the two measures is r2 = 0.034. In other words, there is only the weakest relationship between per capita tax and GPP score. Here is a scatter plot for visual confirmation:

I feel vindicated. My early impressions were right. The perpetual whiners in this state who claim that our government is broken, inefficient, poorly performing, bloated, ineffective, incompetent, and expensive are wrong—they don’t know how good they have it. They’ve hunkered down so tightly on the compound that they’ve lost touch with reality.

The facts are plain and can be evaluated objectively…Washington state is one of the greatest values around in state government. And, judging by the recent increases in both the GPP scores and the Forbes rankings, Washington is not only a great value, but has been improving.

The per capita figures don’t mean much to most citizens, given that Washington suffers from a severe maldistribution of the state/local tax burden. With the bottom 20% paying 4.5 times the percentage of their income in state/local taxes than the top 20% it’s clear that some Washingtonians are overtaxed while others are undertaxed. Our state is a prime candidate for revenue-neutral tax reform; low-income households and small businesses pay too much, the rich and big corporations not enough.

“The per capita figures don’t mean much to most citizens, given that Washington suffers from a severe maldistribution of the state/local tax burden.”

Yep…a real weakness of Washington is the regressive tax structure. However, when comparing states it is difficult to include a better (yet simple) measure. In that sense, the per-person cost for a unit increase in performance grade is a useful measure.

Interesting how the same wingnuts who supported I-695 and every other revenue-gutting scheme to come down the pike are now blaming Gregoire for ferries falling apart. I would say THEY not Gregoire are the culprits.

Imagine if Rossi were Governor and we could score 1st place in all 3. And, people who ride the ferries should pay for the ferries. I ride snowmobiles and never once did a ferry rider pitch in for snowmobile parts.

But I-695 wasn’t about making the state a better place in any real sense. It was an appeal to individual greed and selfishness—a “free ice cream cones for everyone!” gimmick— that didn’t fully disclose the consequences for local government services

That is because people here are suckers. They actually believe donks. Washington would be a conservative state if democrats were not liars. When was the last time you heard a dem say “this is going to cost you” when they promise the moon. Never. Why do you think Eyeman’s initiatives are so popular. roof roof

Love the analysis, especially the correlation cross-check. This isn’t because I like the conclusion, but because I like the methodology.

It also confirms my impressions. I moved here in `92 (having previously paid taxes in CA, MN, and WI) and was pleased with how much of my paycheck I got to keep in WA — yet WA somehow maintained decent infrastructure and an excellent university system. It always seemed to me that State Gov’t was pretty lean.

I wonder what a similar analysis would show for King Co. and Seattle. I’m guessing that KC would stack up pretty well, but I don’t have any idea about Seattle.

For heaven’s sake Darryl…don’t even attempt to decrypt “wingnut logic”. To the Eymanites, Forbes, Fortune, the Pew survey and anything else within spitting range is to be defined as mere socialist propaganda if so doing serves their purpose of patting their tummies while declaring All Things Governmental, All Things Democrat and All Things Regulatory to be the work of Satan himself.

These people aren’t working from any of the postulates that define our time or assume any validity to the social contract. They won’t be satisfied until we return to the order of things that prevailed in the 14th century, and then they’ll just keep bitching out of habit.

6 and 9- In post 6 you point out that I-695 has been ruled unconstitutional…and yet then in post 9 you blame I-695 for the ferry system? If I-965 has been ruled unconstitutional, it has no impact on the ferry system correct? Or did it for a period of time?

Darryl, thanks for the answer there! So I-695 was the whole car tabs bill ($30 tabs) right? My tabs are still $150 again this year. I know there is an RTA tax, regional transit, that is quite a bit. But I do notice a $30 fee labeled as “license fee”. So its that license fee that was I695. And even though it was ruled unconstitutional our state legislature STILL allowed it??

I695 was ruled unconstitutional because the initiative had two distinct topics built into it: (1) car tabs, (2) a I690 style 2/3s majority requirement. The Washington Constitution explicitly states that laws must only cover a single topic. Hence, Eyman’s initiative clearly violated the Constitution. The $30 car tab component of the initiative was not ruled unconstitutional.

as you may have noticed, sarcasm is lost on the bunny. he usually doesnt understand it so he’ll just get crabby and call you names like “wingnut” etc right away if he thinks you may be voicing the “opposing side” of wherever he is, so dont take it personally. flip side of the pudbutt, that one, and every bit as self-righteous whenwrong. cartoons are funny.

I-695 was successful because people voted for it and it won in the election. The fact that the biased, Democrat-controlled state supreme court said it’s unconstitutional doesn’t mean it lost the election. And, as I recall, car tabs still aren’t in the six or seven hundred dollar range any more. As a matter of fact, I have 3 vehicles whose tabs were due in February and March, and I think the total bill for all three for 2009 tabs was about $200. That’s a long goddam ways away from $600 or $700 each!

Washington gets enough tax money from us all, Darryl. If you feel strongly about paying more, I’m sure the Department of Revenue will cash any check you send to them.

RR,this is a very biased blog even if you throw in a fact now and again. Liberals aren’t any more truthful than everyone else. The conservatives and us non-aligned folks come here to make fun of you all and point out your flaws. I’m sure people do the same over at Stefan’s blog, too.

Darryl, thanks for doing the math. I especially appreciated that every time I started to have that “yes, but what about…” moment, the next paragraph would address that point (I was concerned that the relative cost to taxpayers was already factored into the government grade).

I moved here, from the South, in 1979, and I was immediately impressed by how much better off, economically, the people were here. Blue collar workers not only owned pretty nice homes, but had RV’s or boats (sometimes both!) in the driveways, and time available to use them. I noticed that there was a significant amount of federal money here – partly because of our location & proximity to the sea. The trade componant of our economy was booming. It was quite a difference from scrapping to get by, and the federal minimum wage was considered a “good job, if you can get it”.

When my daughter went away to college, she said she wanted to go “anywhere but here”. After a year in college out-of-state, she returned, telling her friends about how good they have it out here in Washington State.

“The main reason Pew gave Washington it’s grade was because of public dog-and-pony shows by the governor giving the appearance there was accountability. Very shallow analysis.”

Sometimes you have useful opinions, but this is not one of them. (I.e. the “shallow analysis” claim seems to be a case of projection.)

(1) If you read the Pew methodology, there isn’t consideration of gubernatorial “dog and pony shows” for Washington or any other state.

(2) Washington state ranked identically (third best), with slightly lesser grades in the Feb, 2005 report. There was no Gregoire “dog and pony” show when the research was actually being conducted in 2004.

“I-695 was successful because people voted for it and it won in the election.”

Indeed. It was successful in this regard. “Free ice cream cones for EVERYONE!!!”

“The fact that the biased, Democrat-controlled state supreme court said it’s unconstitutional doesn’t mean it lost the election.”

No. It had nothing to do with ideology. The Supreme court did not rule on the merits of the two pieces of legislation contained within I695 (1. Voter approval for any tax increase, and 2. License tab fees of $30 per year for motor vehicles). The two topics clearly violate the state Constitution:

Article I Section 19. BILL TO CONTAIN ONE SUBJECT. No bill shall embrace more than one subject, and that shall be expressed in the title.

“And, as I recall, car tabs still aren’t in the six or seven hundred dollar range any more. As a matter of fact, I have 3 vehicles whose tabs were due in February and March, and I think the total bill for all three for 2009 tabs was about $200. That’s a long goddam ways away from $600 or $700 each!”

If you had three VERY expensive cars, you MIGHT get hit with $600 to $700 each. But, the tab for a 1996 SUV in my household was only $300 in 1999. My 11 year-old econobox car tab in 1999 was $30 as I recall.

I moved here from Pennsylvania, where I not only paid a hefty sales tax, but I also paid a flat tax of ~3% of my income (with no personal exemptions) every year.

The total car tab tax for the two SUVs and one econobox cars we brought to WA in 1999 was under 1/3 of our household’s combined income tax in PA the previous year.

“Washington gets enough tax money from us all, Darryl. If you feel strongly about paying more, I’m sure the Department of Revenue will cash any check you send to them.”

What the fuck???? Because I point out what a bargain our government is, suddenly I “feel strongly about paying more” taxes? What a pathetically childish non sequitur.

Darryl In your 50 state table, it would interesting to note the party “responsible” for each state’s level of success. Do redder or bluer states tend toward lower scores? And more importantly, is there a correlation between efficiency and party in power?

Would you believe that despite our great rankings you show for Utah, our conservative legislature still thinks our state government is screwing everything up and can’t be trusted? And that we need tax cuts every year to keep this “monster” in check?

Totally true. The wingnuts are stupid. Washington State is FAR from perfect…news flash, NO state is perfect. But if you’ve ever lived anywhere else (say Illinois where I’m from) you’d recognize our government as a near paradise. You wanna bitch about Gregoire? You think she’s bad? Good GOD, get out of the state every few decades and look around. I’d take her 100 times over compared to Blagojevich in Illinois. Sure places like Alabama have low taxes, but does anyone in the United States use that state as anything other than a joke? When Alabama becomes the new high-tech, bio-tech, or industrial powerhouse and rank in the top 10 educational systems I’ll take them seriously. But they just prove if you starve the system entirely (as opposed to running it relatively efficiently like we do) you just get a bankrupt junk state.

I695 got rid of the “sales tax equalization” and all the other inequities and idiocies that were associated w/ the HUGE license tab fees.

The idea that all tab fees were collected, run the the Olympia “sieve” and then communistically redistributed back to the cities was ludicrous: If cities want the tax base, they should support business; everything else is an immoral redistribution of wealth.

This huge bureaucracy contributed (contributes) nothing to honest government; it’s just a jobs program for communists.

Also, why should a family driving a $25k econobox (helping the environment, you know) pay more than a feller driving the 3 ton, 20 year old truck?

Maybe I should correct myself. If the decline in apparent political intelligence in Alabama over the last 15 years has a parallel in the ability of its engineers, I dunno if I’d want to ride on one of their next batch of rockets.

The Pew report is based on analyses done in 2007 and early 2008 using (mostly) current data.

The tax data in my analysis of efficiency is based on 2005 tax revenues because that is the most recent data available from the U.S. Census Bureau.

“Alot has happened in our state since ‘05.”

Yet there is great stability in the measures. Just compare the 2005 Pew GPP report with the 2008 Pew GPP. The stability is because, even when leadership changes, the procedures, rules, laws, programs, and (most) people don’t change very fast. Improvements are incremental and cumulative.

In other words, one GROWS good government over many years. But, as the Bush administration has shown, the wrong leader can torch a good government to the ground in no time flat.

Actually – the tax structure here is acknowledged to be unstable – if the economy is growing and doing well – then we have lot’s of money. When there is a recession and people actually need more services – we are short on money and can’t even fund education.

Class size in Washinton state is an embarassment. We need more and better trained teachers and need to pay them more – period!

the best solution would be to eliminate the sales tax completely and outlaw it forever – to be replaced by an income tax (with a strong capital gains component) and a tax on corporate profits – not a BO tax. Make the busiensses pulling in the biggest bucks pay more than the little guys – and tax the richest people and their capital gains not the people gioing to the hardware store to fix their house up.

Great analysis and post. FYI – I was at a small get-together with Gregoire this past Saturday with other local Democratic PCOs. She’s kicking off her re-election ground game and knows she needs strong help at grassroots levels. She really talked up the Forbes and Pew rankings as displays of the strength of state government.

Totally ditto comments about WA versus most other states. You want dysfunctional, move to the east coast for a while. Things may happen faster, but it’s typically because someone bribed the right folks to get the outcome they wanted.

I just renewed my driver’s license. I waited for 5 minutes, in a clean brightly lit waiting room. The process took another 5 minutes, I walked away with a temporary renewal license, and my real ID came in the mail in 2 days. Holy crap! I dare you to find better service in a DOL office anywhere else in the country.

And for all the car tab haters – you only hated it because you actually had to write the check each year. If you had a 1% income tax, it would just disappear from your paycheck and no way I-695 would have won. I moved here in 99 too and was surprised at how many people were idiots. Taxes are the price of a (sometimes) civilized society.

It would be wonderful if facts played a bigger role in elections. Darryl’s analysis may also reflect the number of billionaire4s in this state. Aside from their own general lack of paying taxes. each of these obscenely rich folks comprises a corporation-like entity with employees. Whether Gregoire deserves the credit for the billionaire boom is arguable.

Presumably, CG is smart enough to USE Darryl’s analysis as a campaign tool?

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